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Press, Volume LV, Issue 16426, 21 January 1919, Page 6

The people of the whole Empire will j bo moved to deep sympathy with their J Majesties the King and Queen, on account of the sad blow which has befallen thom in the death of their youngest boy, and on that account probably the most dearly beloved. It is particularly 6ad that this should have occurred at tho end of the very severe and protracted strain induced by the war, and just on the eve of the peace rejoicings. a— \ Paderewski, it seems, is to be Premier of the new Polish Republic, and not its President, as erroneously stated some little time ago by American newspapers. One would not imagine that a highly-strung nature like that of tho great pianist was quite fitted for the rough-and-tum-ble conditions of politics, but Polish politics are not exactly those of a stablo and settled country. They are largely a matter of patriotism, and few leaders among the Poles are filled with a greater love of his native country than is Paderewski. Dame Melba, one of his personal friends, speaking to an interviewer shortly before she left Australia the other day, referred to Paderewski's work in America in raising an army corps of Poles, Czechs, and Slovaks, to help tho Allies, and went on to say that to realise how well suited he was to lead men, one must have heard him as an orator —"he is as accomplished, as brilliant, and as compelling a speaker as he is as a musician. He is magnetic, he has the faculty of attaching people* to him, and the gift of converting' them to his point of view"—a quality which should serve him well in his new position, while his possession of great wealth, and estates in Poland, Switzerland, and California frees him from any suspicion of self-seeking motives.

Australian papers lately contained a cable message from London to the effect that experts at the Meteorological Office discredited the report that the Australian Meteorological Department was able to "materially stimulate-rain-fall by scientific means." One of the English officials was reported, to have declined to believe the report, as such claims hitherto had been made only by humbugs, and if the moisturo-laden atmosphere of England could not bo stimulated, it was not likely that Australia's clearer skies would respond to "scientific means." No one in Australia seems to know whence the alleged report emanated, but the reference is no doubt to the BalsiUie "rain-making invention," with which the Commonwealth Government has been experimenting for some years. It is a device by which electrical energy is liberated in the air, and differ widely as to its effectiveness.

From some rather critical comments in the "Age" on the "invention," -we gather that the Commonwealth Government is running two rain-making stations, though only one appears to he in actual operation. The expenditure last year was £1213, which included the purchase of 9ome land, and this year's estimates includes a vote of £400 for maintenance. We have said that opinions differ as to the utility of the invention, but there is no doubt among scientists that it has no value, and this was the view taken by a committee of enquiry appointed by the New South "Wales Government in November. 1917, which reported that no information had been forthcoming to justify the claim that "any advance has been made in Australia in the direction of . causing or increasing rainfall." On the other hand, the present Acting-Premier of tho Commonwealth then declared that "data collected over a period of 15 or 16 years indicate that Mr Balsillie's scheme has induced an increased rainfall of between 50 and 70 per cent, in what is known as the Bookaloo area" —the original rainmaking 6tation.

If that assertion were scientifically accurate, as all statements on such a subject Should be, the Commonwealth Government would stand convicted of the grossest negligence of public welfare in not establishing rain-making stations all over large areas of Australia, and the Governments of other countries would be similarly guilty for neglecting

to follow tho example. As the "Age" points out, the last Victorian harvest yield fell off by about 50 per cent, for the want of rain, and this year drought on a disastrous scale threatened New South "Wales. If the Balsillie scheme achieved only half of what is claimed for it in one isolated area, it would be well ■worth while for the Commonwealth Government to spend a hundred times £400 on it. Tho fact that they still only tinker with it, and that Australia is still at the mercy of drought conditions, shows quite plainly that even tho £400 to be tpent on the scheme this vear is waste of money.